Free Gill Man's Girl by Carolina Connor

Chapter One
     
    Her mother had often told her she was born without fear. It was true, Lita Lawrence hadn't known the feeling, either often or to any extent to write home about. But this might be the exception.
    She woke in a grotto unable to move. Her gaze roamed over her surroundings. Obsidian stone stalactites stared back at her, and dark slate-colored walls had crystals winking from them. The cave must've been made from volcanic activity. As for herself, she didn't discern any pain and so laid there for several minutes trying to recall what happened and where she was. She had been flying in a Cessna seaplane with Professor Moreno and his collegiate assistant, Bobby Williams. They had come to the Amazon to study the Pirarucu, Arapaima gigas, one of the largest freshwater fish native to South America. They were over Venezuela when the engines sputtered, smoked, and gave out. Down they had gone in a roaring, gut-wringing plunge.
    She took a deep breath and, without moving anything but her neck, looked herself over. Goo covered her lower extremities and her arms from the elbows down. It was slimy, a dark gray-green color, about the consistency of egg whites. When she put some effort into it, she pulled one hand free with a sucking thonk sound, and then the other. The substance resembled slime the eels in the area secreted. She slung it off enough to wipe a hand over her head. As expected the slime was there, as well. The whole place smelled of fish. She must look positively delightful and smell even better, she thought.
    She'd known in her heart of hearts this had been a bad idea. The only reason she'd been dissuaded from her studio apartment in Ruston, Louisiana was the promise of a fast track to her doctorate. Ending up in the Amazon was the last thing on her agenda, and quite frankly was the reason she'd changed the specialization of her biology major three times. But she'd followed the stupid doctorate carrot Doctor Moreno had dangled, including the standard assurances:
    “It would only be a week—ten days at the most.” 
    “We'll be in a hotel in San Carlos.”
    It turned out San Carlos barely had covered toilets here and there, much less a hotel. Yet, here she was. Somewhere in a tunnel with fish slime all over her.
    Spectacular.
    Lita extracted herself and sat up to remove the gunk from her legs. To take her mind from the repulsive, smelly task, she tried to remember anything that happened after the crash. Where were the others? Who had brought her here? Where was she and why?
    When she had removed enough of the slime to release her legs, she slid—literally—from the rock and tested her footing. The glittering ground was firm and her legs didn't give way under her weight. No pain, so again she presumed nothing was broken. She still had on her khaki shorts and blue halter top, neither blood-stained, though both were streaked with black muck. The place felt like a giant conch shell, complete with whirling echoes that sounded like the ocean. There was no way to tell where they originated, and the scientist in her knew it was just an auditory illusion attributed to the shape and configuration of the cave when it was formed. An old second grade puzzle book had once told her: When in doubt, go left. Or something like that. With no other bearing from which to begin, that was normally her course of action.
    She stepped with care, watchful for shells or glass since her boots had been lost somewhere. It struck her belatedly that she could see rather well in the grotto, although there weren't any lamps or torches. It must be a trick of the obsidian walls which allowed daylight to parallel reflect deep into the caverns. It was quite nice actually.
    Every so often a waft of air would flow through and cause her to shiver. Foreign noises detached themselves from the whorl of the ocean sounds and grew louder.  So at the next passageway, Lita went right, toward the din. After about twenty more steps, the tunnel opened into a